Sixty-year-old Abdi Khalif Aden has spent his entire life without a Kenyan national ID, despite relentless attempts to secure one.
Like many ethnic-Somalis in Kenya, Aden lacks a birth certificate, forcing him into a rigorous vetting process to prove his nationality.
Clutching his late uncle’s identification card, he considers it the only fragile link to his Kenyan roots and legal existence.
“Being without an ID is very hard,” Aden told AFP, describing how the lack of documentation has stripped him of basic rights.
Without an ID, he cannot move freely, access healthcare, or even open a bank account—his life confined within invisible borders.
In 2014, after paying 7,000 Kenyan shillings ($54) to apply, he was dismissed with a cold response: “We don’t know you.”
Kenya introduced ID vetting in the 1990s for security reasons, but rights groups argue it unfairly targets Muslim-majority communities.
Moses Gwovi, a citizenship rights advocate at Namati, warns that vetting committees hold unchecked power over people’s fate.
“Without an ID card, one has no rights at all as a citizen. Every aspect of a person’s life is crushed,” Gwovi said.
According to Kenya’s National Bureau of Statistics, 2.5 million people—9% of adults—remain undocumented, trapped in bureaucratic limbo.
Corruption haunts the process, with reports of bribes determining who gets identification and who remains stateless.
Aden, a father of four, recalls being bypassed in vetting because another applicant paid a higher bribe to officials.
His statelessness has cost him dearly—he has never voted, never traveled beyond Wajir County, and even spent seven months in jail.
A January court ruling declared that Kenyan Somalis were wrongfully denied citizenship after being categorized as refugees.
In response, President William Ruto announced the abolishment of vetting committees, pledging equal treatment for northern Kenyans.
“We want the people of Northern Kenya to feel equal to the rest of the country,” Ruto stated earlier this month.
However, critics accuse him of electioneering, using the issue to secure votes ahead of Kenya’s 2027 presidential election.